Tribal College Libraries

Compares American Indian college libraries with depositories in U.S. territories in the Pacific, and argues for their inclusion in the Federal Depository Library Program

Tribal College Libraries

Compares American Indian college libraries with depositories in U.S. territories in the Pacific, and argues for their inclusion in the Federal Depository Library Program

Critical Flicker Frequency in a Harp Seal, \u3ci\u3ePagophilus groenlandicus\u3c/i\u3e (Erxleben, 1777)

Critical flicker frequency (CFF) in a free-swimming harp seal (Pagophilus groenlandicus) was investigated using behavioral techniques. The resulting CFF versus intensity contour indicates a definite rod-cone break, confirming a duplex photoreceptor population whose presence had not been observed in previous morphological reports

Comparing Texts of the \u3ci\u3eOkmulgee Constitution\u3c/i\u3e: Fourteen Instrument Versions and Levenshtein’s Edit Distance Metric

In 1870, the Five Civilized and other tribes within the Indian Territory initiated a series of council meetings to deal with seven federal stipulations presented at Fort Smith in 1865 and with new treaties established in 1866. One development was the so-called December 1870 Okmulgee Constitution, fashioned in the Creek capital, that provided a model for a new full-fledged Indian state to replace the Territory. Various versions of the text of that document (and of a revised rendition) were published, as part of the official and unofficial record of the sequence of proceedings. This study examined fourteen variants of that Okmulgee Constitution, in terms of the documents‘ provenance and of their variability as quantified through the application of Levenshtein‘s edit distance algorithm

An Analysis of the Variants of the Okmulgee Constitution

The creation of the Okmulgee Constitution was a significant chapter in the history of Indian Territory and Oklahoma, but it is less well-known beyond those boundaries. This instrument was initially fashioned in 1870 and later contemplated at joint tribal meetings mandated by the federal government following the Civil War. The Five Civilized Tribes had been removed from the southeastern United States to lands obtained through the Louisiana Purchase in the first half of the nineteenth century, and at the beginning of the Civil War these and other tribes of Indian Territory consummated nine treaties with the Confederate States of America. Following that conflict and those alliances, the tribes found themselves in desperate straits with the federal government. In seven stipulations presented at Fort Smith in September 1865 and through a series of new treaties formed the following year, federal authorities dictated future prospects. Significantly, proviso number six from the Fort Smith assembly declared that it is the policy of the government, unless other arrangements be made, that all the nations and tribes in Indian territory be formed into one consolidated government, after the plan proposed by the Senate of the United States, in a bill for organizing the Indian territory

In the Most Friendly & Conciliatory Manner: A Proposed Final Version of the \u3ci\u3eTreaty of Fort Laramie with Sioux, etc., 1851\u3c/i\u3e

The Treaty of Fort Laramie with Sioux, etc., 1851 was one of the most important contracts formed between the federal government and the Indian tribes of the Great Plains. It served as more than just a continuation of federal Indian policy, initiated by the Lewis and Clark Expedition at the beginning of the nineteenth century. Rather, it was an attempt to protect those involved in the ever-increasing American expansion into the West by eliminating intertribal animosities and by setting rigid territorial boundaries for the tribes. Unfortunately, this critical document was never published in a correct final state. A Web site – http://treatyoffortlaramie1851. unl.edu – has been created to describe and present a proposed text to fill that void, based on various earlier such federal materials, but especially upon the original 1851 treaty now kept at the National Archives

The Deployment of the Terms \u3ci\u3eIndigenous\u3c/i\u3e, \u3ci\u3eAboriginal\u3c/i\u3e, and \u3ci\u3eIndian(s)\u3c/i\u3e in the Texts of International Constitutions

Indigenous societies around the world are stepping forward to assert their place as an equal partner in their nation’s future. In many cases, these efforts have been undertaken in response to the development and the 2007 publication of the Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, as endorsed by the United Nations Working Group on Indigenous Populations. Governments also have begun to reconsider their stance on the associated issues. The digital texts of 189 international constitutions – as offered by the Constitute Web site – were examined for occurrences of the four tokens indigenous, aboriginal, and Indian or Indians to yield country indices. Documents from forty countries were found to contain the term indigenous and seven possessed aboriginal (N uses = 320 and 19, respectively). The more familiar token Indian, or its plural, occurred 88 times in ten of these political affirmations

Insights from editions of The Annual Register regarding later variants of the Royal Proclamation of 1763: An application of Levenshtein’s edit distance metric - Website Announcement & Link

Variants of King George III’s Royal Proclamation of 1763, found in ten editions of the sixth volume of The Annual Register for that year, were examined through the application of Levenshtein’s edit distance metric to identify textual discrepancies across these renditions. Induced textual errors were carried into later editions of the 1763 Annual Register. The presence of distinct faults in Proclamation texts taken from other independent publications indicated that the latter must have used deviant Register versions as their sources. Table I and Table II (Excel spreadsheets) are attached (below)